The thugs, on vacation? Never. On the contrary, in France, 30% of home thefts take place in July, August and December, according to the Home Safety Observatory. This would be equivalent to 87,000 burglaries out of the 290,000 recorded by the SSMSI (ministerial statistical service for internal security), in 2021.
And precisely, the scoundrels redouble their imagination when it comes to forcing the doors of the apartments. A new silent technique made its appearance this summer: the dissolution of the lock by a corrosive liquid. This new operating mode is very simple, since it suffices to introduce a little acid into the lock.
Since the beginning of the summer, 50 facts of this type have been declared in Île-de-France, informs FranceInfo. Some cities are particularly affected… Planet has produced the slideshow below which lists them, based on data collected by Le Parisien.
“This product, which could be acid or liquid nitrogen, causes the deterioration of the closing system and allows criminals to open by sliding a tool inside without damaging the door” says a police officer in the columns of the media cited above. In addition, according to a locksmith interviewed by FranceInfo, this method would only take ten seconds to open the door of a home…
At the moment, the police forces have no leads: “We don’t know if they are old burglars, a gang from Eastern Europe or from a Parisian city”.
